Continuing jobless claims in the week ended July 26 fell to 2.518 million from 2.542 million in the preceding week. . .
The four-week moving average was 293,500, a decrease of 4,000 from the previous week’s total of 297,500. The monthly average is seen as a more accurate gauge of labor trends because it reduces volatility in the week-to-week data.
These two stats are the most important, the first is over looked, assuming it is going down because people are finding work and not because they are falling off after exhausting benefits, it shows that the job market is expanding. Although they psot the weekly first time claims, it should be ignored and really just look at the 4 week average. Any number of things can affect the weekly claims.
Even a 4 week moving average is useless if they are “adjusting” the numbers. Why can’t they simply give the exact number of first time applications?
One thing that is also a concern is that many States are still behind getting applications approved, so those applications that have not been processed are not included in these numbers.